bull-dozing (was Re: "tough luck" (1876))

[Benjamin Zimmer]

Sam Clements <SClements at NEO.RR.COM> wrote:
>
>Using Proquest, from _The Atlanta Constitution_  19 Nov. 1876, p.2
>
>"The new slang term from the South, "bull-dozing," which means
>intimidation, is having tough luck in the newspapers, the proof-readers
>and type-settters not having mastered it yet.  It appears as
>"bull-doging" in most of the papers, thus casting an undeserved odium
>upon the faithful creature who keeps the lettter-carrier at bay, and
>who has nothing whatever to do with politics."
>
>Jon--interesting that "bull-dozing" appears in this cite, and M-W cites
>it from 1876.  (I don't have a clue if that's their cite).

Joanne M. Despres <jdespres at MERRIAM-WEBSTER.COM> wrote:
>
>The Collegiate's 1876 date is backed by a quotation that appears in
>Mitford Mathews' Dictionary of American English, William Craigie's
>Dictionary of Americanisms, and Farmer & Henley's Dictionary of
>Slang; it reads:
>
>1876 N.Y. Tribune 23 Dec. 6/4  If the State of Connecticut . . . had
>any apprehensions lest . . . their representatives . . . might be
>'intimidated, or 'bulldosed,' or 'terrorized' [etc.]

The New York Times and Chicago Tribune have cites for the participial
adjective "bull(-)dozing" from July 1876, both reprinted from the New
Orleans Republican. It doesn't appear as a novel use in these cites, so
Louisiana papers no doubt have further antedatings.

-----
New York Times, July 5, 1876, p. 8/3
>From the _New-Orleans Republican_, June 28.
The white citizen is alive and well enough to-day; but it is not well
enough with the dead victims of the mad~men, and it is not well enough
with the bulldozing community whose stained and bloody hands are yet ready
to do further deeds of violence.
-----
Chicago Tribune, July 18, 1876, p. 2/2
_New Orleans Republican_.
So complete is the reign of terror created by the bull-dozing Regulators
of East Feliciana and East Baton Rouge that half of the inhuman
brutalities practiced on innocent colored men will never be told.
-----


--Ben Zimmer